Governments of the twelve countries then Members of the Commonwealth each presented six chairs for the main conference room. On 28th March 1962 Marlborough House came into use as a Commonwealth centre. The main purpose of Marlborough House is to serve as a centre for Commonwealth meetings in London. The most important of these meetings are the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Meetings. Fifteen Meetings of Commonwealth Prime Ministers have been held in London since 1944; the 1962 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Meeting was the first to be held at Marlborough House. Marlborough House stands to the east of St. James's Palace, between the Mall and Pall Mall. The main central part of the house now provides on the ground floor a suite of conference rooms for Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Meetings and other Commonwealth meetings, together with secretariat offices and reception rooms. On the upper floors there are offices for Prime Ministers and their accompanying delegations and staffs. A small radio and television studio is in the basement. The East and West Wings contain the offices of the Commonwealth Secretariat and the Commonwealth Foundation. The Commonwealth Secretariat maintains a Commonwealth Information Centre and Reading Room, on the ground floor of the West Wing, which is open to the public from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays to Fridays. Adjoining is a Press Conference room used for briefings during official conferences, and available at other times to Commonwealth organisations for exhibitions, discussion groups, film showings, etc. When Marlborough House is not in use for Commonwealth meetings the assembly and conference rooms and other former state apartments are open to the public at stated times from Easter Sunday until the last Sunday in September. |